Strategic Teaming in Government Contracting: When and How to Partner

Why Teaming Is Essential in GovCon

Government contracting rewards breadth and depth simultaneously. Solicitations routinely require a combination of technical capabilities, past performance across multiple domains, geographic coverage, and socioeconomic participation -- all in a single proposal. Very few companies, even large ones, can deliver all of this alone.

Strategic teaming is how you bridge the gap between what you have and what the evaluation criteria demand. According to FPDS data, the majority of contracts over $25 million involve some form of teaming arrangement, whether through subcontracting, joint ventures, or contractor teaming agreements.

"In government contracting, your team is your proposal. The evaluators are not just scoring your company -- they are scoring the collective capability, experience, and management structure of your entire team."

Teaming Structures: CTA vs. Subcontracting vs. Joint Venture

Contractor Teaming Arrangement (CTA)

A CTA is an agreement between two or more companies to jointly pursue a specific opportunity, with one company designated as the prime contractor and the others as teammates who will serve as subcontractors if the team wins.

When to use a CTA:

• You need a partner's past performance or capabilities for the proposal
• The opportunity does not require the depth of commitment that a joint venture entails
• You want flexibility to team differently on future opportunities
• The partnership is opportunity-specific, not a long-term structural arrangement

Key CTA provisions:

• Exclusivity: Will your partner commit to not teaming with a competitor on the same opportunity? This is standard practice but must be explicitly stated.
• Workshare allocation: Define what each party is responsible for, expressed as a percentage of the total contract value or specific task areas.
• Proposal responsibilities: Who writes which sections? Who provides which past performance references? Who contributes which key personnel?
• Pricing coordination: How will you share cost data necessary for an integrated pricing proposal?
• Termination provisions: Under what conditions can either party exit the arrangement?

Limitations of CTAs: A CTA is a pre-award agreement. It describes intentions, not binding contractual obligations. If you win, the actual relationship is governed by the subcontract agreement, not the CTA. This means CTAs are only as strong as the trust between the parties and the specificity of their terms.

Subcontracting

Subcontracting is the most common form of teaming in government contracting. The prime contractor holds the contract with the government, and the subcontractor performs a defined scope of work under a separate agreement with the prime.

Advantages:

• Clear chain of command: The prime manages the government relationship; the subcontractor executes their scope
• Flexible scope: Subcontract scope can be adjusted (within contract limitations) as requirements evolve
• Lower barrier to entry: Subcontracting positions require less organizational overhead than prime contracts

Key subcontracting considerations:

• Flow-down clauses: Federal contracts include clauses that must be flowed down to subcontractors (FAR 52.244-6). Ensure your subcontract agreements include all required flow-downs.
• Payment terms: The government typically pays prime contractors within 30 days. Prime contractors are required to pay subcontractors within 30 days of receiving payment. Verify this is in your subcontract agreement.
• Performance monitoring: The prime is responsible for subcontractor performance. Establish clear deliverables, milestones, and quality standards.
• Small business subcontracting plans: Contracts over $750,000 (or $1.5M for construction) require large business primes to submit small business subcontracting plans. If you are a small business, this creates opportunities.

Joint Ventures

A joint venture (JV) is a separate legal entity formed by two or more companies to pursue and perform government contracts. JVs are most commonly used in the mentor-protege context (see our small business set-aside guide) but can be formed between any companies.

When a JV makes sense:

• The opportunity is large enough to justify the overhead of creating a separate entity
• You need to combine past performance from both entities under a single contractor
• Set-aside rules require a small business prime, but the scope demands large business capabilities (mentor-protege JV)
• The parties anticipate pursuing multiple opportunities together over several years

JV structural requirements (for small business JVs under SBA rules):

• The small business must own at least 51% of the JV
• The small business managing venturer must control the JV's operations
• A populated JV (with its own employees) must ensure the small business performs at least 40% of the work
• An unpopulated JV (employees remain with their parent companies) must ensure the small business performs the required percentage under the applicable limitations on subcontracting

Selecting the Right Teaming Partner

Partner selection is one of the most consequential decisions in capture management. A strong teammate amplifies your proposal; a weak one can sink it.

Evaluation Criteria for Potential Partners

Capability fit:

• Do they fill a genuine gap in your capabilities?
• Is their expertise relevant to the specific requirements of this opportunity?
• Do their past performance references align with the evaluation criteria?

Cultural compatibility:

• How do they approach project management and quality control?
• What is their reputation with this customer?
• Are they responsive and collaborative during the proposal process?

Financial stability:

• Can they sustain operations if government payments are delayed?
• Do they have the financial capacity to ramp up staffing for a new contract?
• Are they a credit risk as a subcontractor?

Strategic alignment:

• Are their long-term business goals compatible with yours?
• Will this partnership create future opportunities or future competitors?
• Do they have existing relationships or contract vehicles that benefit the team?

"The best teaming partner is not always the biggest company or the one with the most past performance. It is the one whose strengths complement yours in the specific dimensions that the evaluation criteria weight most heavily."

Red Flags in Potential Partners

Watch for these warning signs during teaming discussions:

• Reluctance to share past performance details -- they may have performance problems they are hiding
• Unwillingness to commit key personnel -- their best people may already be committed elsewhere
• Vague workshare discussions -- if they cannot articulate what they will do, they likely have not thought it through
• History of teaming then competing -- some companies team to gather intelligence, then bid against you on the next opportunity
• Excessive pricing demands -- a partner who insists on premium rates may make your overall price non-competitive

Workshare Allocation

Workshare defines who does what -- and it is where most teaming relationships either solidify or fall apart.

Principles of Effective Workshare

1. Align workshare with capabilities: Assign scope to the partner best qualified to perform it. This seems obvious, but workshare negotiations often prioritize revenue allocation over performance optimization.

2. Respect limitations on subcontracting: Federal regulations require prime contractors to perform a certain percentage of the work (generally 50% for services, with variations by contract type). Ensure your workshare allocation complies.

3. Create clean handoffs: Define clear boundaries between each partner's scope. Ambiguous interfaces create execution risk and finger-pointing during performance.

4. Balance revenue and risk: Higher workshare means more revenue but also more performance risk. Partners should share risk proportionate to their workshare and capacity.

5. Document everything: Workshare should be documented in the teaming agreement with sufficient specificity that both parties have the same understanding of responsibilities.

Common Workshare Models

Risk Allocation in Teaming Agreements

Every teaming arrangement involves risk. The agreement should address how risks are identified, allocated, and managed.

Key Risks to Address

Performance risk: What happens if a teammate fails to perform? Include provisions for cure notices, replacement, and the prime's right to reassign scope.

Personnel risk: Key personnel commitments are central to many proposals. What happens if a committed key person becomes unavailable? Define substitution procedures and minimum qualification requirements for replacements.

Financial risk: If a subcontractor's costs overrun on a firm-fixed-price contract, who absorbs the excess? On cost-reimbursable contracts, how are fee and award-fee pools allocated?

Organizational conflict of interest (OCI): Teaming with a partner who has an OCI can disqualify your entire team. Conduct OCI analysis before finalizing teaming arrangements.

Protest risk: A losing bidder may protest the award based on your team composition (e.g., challenging small business status of a JV partner). Ensure your teaming arrangement can withstand size and status protests.

Competitive Pairing: Teaming as a Strategy

Beyond filling capability gaps, teaming is a competitive weapon. Consider these strategic dimensions:

Deny competitors access to key partners: If there is one company with unique qualifications for this opportunity, teaming with them removes that capability from every competing team.

Create the strongest possible evaluation score: Analyze the evaluation criteria weights and build a team that maximizes your score across all factors -- not just technical, but management, past performance, and pricing.

Address perceived weaknesses proactively: If you know evaluators may view your company as too small, too inexperienced in a specific domain, or lacking in geographic coverage, team specifically to address those perceptions.

Build toward future prime positions: Subcontracting today builds the past performance and relationships you need to prime tomorrow. Choose subcontracting positions strategically, on contracts where you will build relevant experience.

Making Teaming Relationships Work

The best teaming agreements mean nothing if the partnership fails during execution. Successful teaming requires:

• Executive-level commitment: Both organizations' leadership must be invested in the partnership's success, not just the BD team.
• Regular communication cadence: Establish formal communication channels and review schedules before the proposal, not after award.
• Shared understanding of roles: Every team member should know who is responsible for what, how decisions are made, and how disputes are resolved.
• Performance metrics: Define measurable success criteria and review them regularly.
• Exit provisions: Every agreement should include clear, fair termination provisions. Partnerships that cannot be exited tend to become adversarial.

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Aliff Solutions helps government contractors identify optimal teaming partners through competitive landscape analysis and incumbent vulnerability scoring. Our platform analyzes competitor relationships, contract performance, and pricing patterns to help you build teams designed to win. Explore our platform capabilities or try our free Win Probability Calculator to assess how teaming affects your competitive position.